


star maker says it ain't so bad

by iguessyouregonnamissthepantyraid



Series: Post-Notpocalypse [1]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Everybody Loves Claire, Fluff, Gen, Good Brother Luther Hargreeves, Hurt/Comfort, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Luther is Big Brother Shaped, Luther's Trying His Best, Past Child Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-10
Updated: 2019-05-10
Packaged: 2020-02-29 15:24:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18780982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iguessyouregonnamissthepantyraid/pseuds/iguessyouregonnamissthepantyraid
Summary: And yet, with all of his reading, with all of his preparation and dedication, with the averted Apocalypse and all of the emotional fallout that came with it —Luther had never, not in a million years, expected a PTSD attack fromKlaus.A few months after the world doesn't end, the Hargreeves are slowly adjusting, settling into routines, figuring out where they fit in a family that's no longer under the control of their father. Luther is no exception.





	star maker says it ain't so bad

**Author's Note:**

> ~~look me in the eye and tell me spaceman isn't a great song for luther, i dare you~~
> 
> i wanted to write luther a chapter for my other fic, [a life still permanent](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18598156), but my brain would only provide this, and this really wouldn't have fit anywhere into that fic in a way that i liked. so! here we have prequel oneshot! woohoo!
> 
> featuring: luther figuring things out, klaus getting a much needed hug, and claire being (obviously) adorable
> 
>  **warnings** for PTSD, panic attacks, mentions of past child abuse, and a brief mention of body dysmorphia

 

Luther did a lot of reading on the moon.

Just… a whole hell of a lot of reading, piles and piles of books and news reports and journal articles, because there was more than enough time for it. He did some writing, too. Notes, when reading got to be impossible because the silence had turned into this awful, stifling buzz in his ears. Poems, when he could actually _think_ and needed to get his thoughts out somehow and straightforward scientific observations weren’t cutting it.

But mostly reading.

The onboard system had an excellent database. He read files on previous moon exhibitions. He read articles on the effects of zero gravity. He read up on geology, on mineral analysis, on carbon dating techniques, on biophysics and structural biology, a little bit in neuroscience. He read twelve mystery novels, seventeen fantasy novels, sixty-three poem anthologies.

So, one would think, when he finally set foot on Earth again, when the whirlwind of the Apocalypse and Five’s return and _everything_ finally died down, that the very last thing he would want to do was read.

But he did. Socialization proved to be exhausting. His siblings, though he loved them, proved to be more exhausting. So he would hole up in his bedroom when it got to be too much, and he would read. It seemed in those first few weeks of peace that all he _did_ was read, alone in his bedroom like he was right back on the moon all over again.

Except this time, it wasn’t biophysics and astrogeology and mineral analysis. It wasn’t novels and poems.

This time it was mostly self-help books. Psychology. Biographies of people who had been through — maybe not _exactly_ what he and his siblings had been through, but something close. Analogous. A mundane sort of equivalent. In those early days, he was still reluctant to call it neglect and flat out refused to call it abuse. His siblings tried to help him along, in ways that ranged from gentle nudges to pointed comments to actual shouting matches, but Luther just was not equipped to make that leap. Not yet.

(As he would soon learn, he was, in fact, fully equipped to make that leap. It was just the fall he was never prepared for.)

(His siblings would help with that, too.)

In any case, he did a lot of reading on recovery from abuse, even if he insisted on detaching that term from himself and from his siblings at first. He read up on anxiety and depression, on addiction recovery, on the effects of isolation on the human psyche — not that he wasn’t already _quite_ familiar with one version of that — and on the different kinds of traumas and on PTSD.

It helped.

Some of it helped him. Some of it helped him help _them,_ or at least helped him understand a little better.

When Five would freeze up in the middle of nowhere, his eyes going glassy and unfocused, Luther would more-or-less know how to handle it and minimize the damage. When Klaus started fidgeting a bit more than usual, started trying to make excuses to leave the house by himself, Luther would know to stick to his side like glue if no one else had already done it. When Diego lashed out, Luther would squash down the urge to insult him back and try not to escalate the situation. Not that he succeeded every time; Diego, after all, was never the only one with a temper.

Vanya was more difficult, naturally. Not because she could blast him through a wall with barely a twitch if he misspoke; she was getting better at controlling that. Not because he’d spent so many years barely interacting with her; that was true of all his siblings, not just her. No, Vanya was more difficult for the simple fact that he still had a ways to go before she would trust him to help at all.

Still. He was _trying._

And yet, with all of his reading, with all of his preparation and dedication, with the averted Apocalypse and all of the emotional fallout that came with it —

Luther had never, not in a million years, expected a PTSD attack from _Klaus._

 

-

 

It happens on a rainy afternoon, the kind of day where everything is muted and gray outside but, because of that, the inside of the Academy seems full to bursting with activity and noise — though, Luther admits, that second part might not really be due to the rain outside.

It probably has a _little_ more to do with the five-year-old girl bouncing around on his shoulders.

“And then,” Claire says as Luther ducks through the doorway into the kitchen to avoid hitting her head on anything, “when I get there, I’m gonna become President of the Moon!”

“Wow,” Luther says, trying and failing not to smile. “President of the Moon.”

The kitchen is already well populated. Klaus is sitting cross-legged on the table in a too-big sweater, his hands hidden beneath his sleeves and a mug of tea held between them. He’s mid-conversation with Vanya, who’s standing at the stove and melting butter in a pan. Five sits at the table with his cheek in hand, eyes down on a textbook he’s got laid out on the table, one hand idly turning a mug of coffee beside him. The seat across from Five is pulled out, a second mug of coffee sitting untouched in front of it, steam wafting up into the air.

Luther ignores the pang that comes with that, the blatant glaring sign that Ben is sitting _right there._ Klaus has been working on the manifesting, and Ben is becoming a more and more constant presence at the Academy every day.

Doesn’t mean Luther is quite used to it yet.

Of the three siblings he can actually _see,_ all of them look up at Luther and Claire as soon as they pass through the doorway, and Klaus breaks into one of those wide toothy smiles that he reserves just for their niece.

“President of the Moon, oh, now, there’s an idea! You would be _such_ a good Moon President, kiddo,” Klaus tells her, one hand on his chest and his gaze drifting up like he just can’t help imagining it. “Your Uncle Ben says so, too. They’ll never know what hit ‘em, all those Moon People up there… doing…” he flaps his right hand, the tea mug in his left hand flinging a few droplets across the table, “… y’know, whatever it is Moon People do. Right, guys?”

“Of course,” Vanya says, offering a rare smile.

“I’d vote for her,” Five speaks up, eyes back down on his book. “She’s certainly the smartest person in this house, anyway.”

Claire giggles, and Luther feels her hunch over to rest her head on top of his, her little arms linking together beneath his chin. “Uncle Five, I’m only _five._ I only know how to read one chapter book so far.”

Five glances up from his book and winks at her. “Exactly.”

“You can be anything you want to be, Claire,” Vanya says after lightly shoving Five with a hand to the back of his head, which he ignores except for an idle swatting at her arm. She turns back to her cooking and asks, “What are you gonna do, as Moon President?”

“Ooh, yes,” says Klaus, bringing his hands together around his mug and lifting it for a sip, waggling his eyebrows at her. “What shall be your first decree, _Madam President de Luna?”_

“For my first decree,” Claire says, drawing herself up straight, “everyone on the moon will be able to fly.”

She stretches her arms out to the side like an airplane, Luther can see it in his peripheral, and he knows that’s his cue. He grabs onto her legs to keep her stable and then hunches down, letting his socks glide across the floor as quickly and smoothly as he can so that Claire can pretend to fly. The act is accompanied by her very best impersonation of what an airplane engine sounds like, or at least what a five-year-old probably thinks an airplane engine sounds like.

_“Nyoooom!”_

This is far from Claire’s first visit to the Academy, and it’s far from the first time she’s asked to ride on her Uncle Spaceboy’s shoulders, and Luther is _more_ than happy to provide. He’s still absolutely terrified to roughhouse with her the way Diego does — it’s easy for Diego to hoist Claire up and lob her into the couch cushions with no warning, after all, since _he_ doesn’t have to worry that he’d knock the whole damn couch over.

But this? This, Luther can do.

“Ooh, look at her _go,”_ Klaus cheers, and as Luther pivots he sees Klaus clamber off the table, weaving around Vanya to get a look at the grilled cheese sandwiches she’s making. “Hey, hey, hey, Vanya, Vanya, Vanya…” he drones, hooking his chin over her shoulder, “… how many of them you plan on making, huh? Benny boy’s dying for a bite—”

_“Klaus.”_

“What? Oh, right, right, poor choice of words, my bad.”

_“Nyoooooom!”_

Five adds without looking up from his book, “Klaus, what did we say about putting words in Ben’s mouth?”

Klaus gives a mock offended gasp and brings his free hand up to his chest, jaw dropped. “For your information, old man, I’m telling the truth. Our dearly departed brother has requested a grilled cheese, how can either of you _possibly_ deny him?”

Vanya rolls her eyes, though she’s smiling, and she shakes out a few more slices of bread from the bag as her first sandwich sizzles in the pan. “I guess you’ll be wanting one, too, then?”

“But of course,” Klaus answers, wrapping one long arm around her shoulders and pressing a kiss to the side of her head. “I’ll need all the strength I can get if I’m gonna manifest him well enough to _eat._ It’s hungry work, you know.”

“I know,” Vanya answers. “Claire, how about you? You want a grilled cheese?”

Luther slides to a stop, and Claire abruptly cuts off her airplane noises with a gasp. “Yes, please! Can you make it extra goopy?”

“One extra goopy grilled cheese, coming right up. Five? Luther?”

It’s the first time since he and Claire have walked in that Vanya’s directly acknowledged him. Not that she’s been _ignoring_ him, per se, there just hadn’t been anything to say until then. That’s all. Five gives a grunt in the affirmative, and Luther clears his throat. “Uh, actually —”

But he doesn’t get the chance to say.

And at first, when it happens, it seems like nothing. And it _is_ nothing, really. A bit of grease must have dripped down the side of the pan, catching on the stovetop flame, and it flares up from the side of the stove like a mini tower of fire. It dies out right away, though, there and gone in half a second like a yellow-and-orange camera flash. No damage, it looks like. No one hurt. No big deal. It does make Vanya jump, though, and directly above her a light bulb _pops,_ shatters right there in its place on the ceiling.

Which, again, not that big a deal. Vanya tends to destroy more than a few light fixtures when she’s startled. They’ve all seen her do it. They’ve got tons of spares stocked up in the storage closet for that very reason.

But something else shatters, too. Something Vanya definitely didn’t break.

“Klaus?” Five asks.

“Hey,” Vanya says, quiet as ever, staring at him just like everyone else is. “You okay?”

His tea is a growing puddle on the floor, the mug reduced to shards, but none of them spare so much as a glance at the mess. Because Klaus hasn’t answered any of them, and he looks practically catatonic, and he isn’t moving.

Or — he _is_ moving, technically, because he’s trembling from head to toe. But he looks like his feet are stuck to the ground, his eyes wide and glassy and fixed on the place where that brief flash of flame had been, his jaw shaking, his shoulders rising and falling with uneven, gasping breaths.

“Uncle Klaus?”

“Hey,” Vanya tries again, reaching one hand out to lightly touch his arm.

But Klaus flinches back, shaking his head, and Vanya raises her hands in surrender.

“I — I, uh…” Klaus stammers, his voice barely above a croak, his eyes still unfocused, and he clumsily feels around for the front of his sweater. When he finally gets a fistful of the fabric he tries to fan himself with it, like he’s overheating, but it doesn’t seem to do much. “I’m, uh — I’m good.” His lips twitch like he’s trying to smile, but the look shatters just as quickly. “S— sorry, I don’t — don’t know why —”

“Hey, it’s okay,” Vanya says. “It’s okay.”

“No — it —” he squeezes his eyes shut, “— it’s _not,_ I’m — I can’t —”

And Luther isn’t exactly sure what caused this, he isn’t exactly sure why a quick little burst of fire or the _pop_ of a light bulb could send Klaus into what definitely seems like the beginnings of an anxiety attack. It could be something Dad did, way back when. It could be something to do with the drugs, or the laundry list of horrible things Klaus experienced in the years he spent trying to _get_ those drugs.

Luther, truthfully, has no idea.

But Claire leans into him and whispers, _“Is Uncle Klaus okay?”_ And Luther, despite his uncertainty, makes an executive decision.

“Five,” he says, his eyes fixed on Klaus. “Take Klaus up to his room.”

 _“What?_ Why would I—?”

“Luther, he can’t—”

“Klaus,” Luther gently cuts both Five and Vanya off, because it looks like he’s starting to hyperventilate, and maybe moving him is not the _ideal_ solution, but Luther knows one thing for certain: Klaus does not want to frighten Claire. Or he wouldn’t, if he were in his right mind enough to think of it. Luther can work on damage control _after_ they get him out of view of their five-year-old niece.

“It’s going to be okay,” he continues. “Five’s gonna take you up to your room so you can sit down.” He directs a pointed look at Five and then an even more pointed jerk of his head toward the ceiling, eyes widening in a way that he hopes clearly conveys his thought of _please just do it._ “And I’ll meet you up there, okay?”

Five drops the argument. Small miracles.

His chair scoots back. He reaches out, hesitates for a beat, and then carefully grabs hold of Klaus’ sweater. There’s a flash of blue, and in the next instant the kitchen is empty save for Luther, Claire, and Vanya.

And, well, he hadn’t really thought that far ahead, hadn’t given much thought to the fact that this is as _alone with Vanya_ as he’s been since… before. He shoves that thought way down — not the time, not the time — and he reaches up to lift Claire off his shoulders and gently settle her so that she’s sitting on the edge of the kitchen table, looking up at him with her big brown eyes swimming with worry.

“What’s wrong with Uncle Klaus?”

“He’s… uh—”

“He’s sick,” Vanya says, coming to his rescue. “But he’ll be okay. Must have just eaten something bad.”

Luther opens his mouth, then closes it. It’s still a little surprising when Vanya speaks up, still a little surprising when she takes initiative. But, hey, that’s as good a lie as any, right? Good enough, anyway, until they talk to Allison and let her decide whether it’s a good idea to explain anxiety attacks to her five-year-old.

Claire’s frown deepens. “He was scared, though.”

“Yeah,” Luther admits. “Yeah, that’s because he hates throwing up.”

She wrinkles her nose, undoubtedly remembering the stomach bug she’d caught when she’d been here… three visits ago? Four? Luther can’t remember, all he remembers is that it had scared the absolute daylights out of everyone in the house except for Allison, who’d calmly told them that _sometimes kids just get sick, guys, relax._

“Yeah,” Claire says. “Me, too.”

Vanya asks, “But even if it stinks, you always feel better after you throw up, right?”

Claire shrugs one shoulder. “Kinda, I guess.”

“Exactly,” Luther says. “Better to just get that kind of thing over with. Like ripping off a band-aid. He’ll be—”

There’s the _shh-fwump_ of spacetime bending behind them, and Luther spins around to find Five already returned, touching down on the tile floor of the kitchen. _Alone._

“What’s going on with him?” Five asks. “I can’t get him to—”

“Five,” Luther cuts him off, desperately trying not to sound like he’s scolding. “You left him alone?”

“What? No, Ben’s with him.”

“You’re sure?” Vanya asks.

“Yeah, I saw him for a second or two. And even when we can’t see him, Klaus can. Now, what’s—?”

 _“Five,”_ Luther says, and yeah, he definitely sounds like he’s scolding now. He pinches the bridge of his nose, wondering how he’s supposed to explain this without sounding condescending. Because, yes, he has no doubt Ben is a perfectly calming presence for Klaus to have, but Five’s just left their hyperventilating brother with the only person in this house who _doesn’t have to breathe._

God, how had he ever thought he _wanted_ to be the leader around here? It’s like herding cats.

“Uncle Five, you gotta go back,” Claire says, and whatever smartass comment Five had clearly been raring to give dies right there, his hackles dropping. “Uncle Ben can’t touch anybody unless Uncle Klaus does his magic, and he can’t do his magic if he’s sick, so Uncle Ben can’t hold his hair or rub his back while he’s throwing up.”

“While he’s…?”

Five shoots a confused look at Luther and then at Vanya, who makes a quick cutthroat motion with her hand that says, _drop it._

“Uh… right,” Five says instead, clearly still at a loss.

“Five, just — please go back up there,” Luther tells him, his voice soft. He’s only just starting to understand why his oldest-but-smallest brother seems so lost, and with that understanding comes a twinge of sympathy. Of _course_ Five wouldn’t recognize an attack like this, he doesn’t know what it looks like from the outside. “Sit with him and make sure he knows you’re there, and try to have him mimic your breathing, okay? Give me two minutes and I’ll take over.”

For a second, it looks like Five might protest, but then he just nods and turns on his heel, disappearing in another ripple of blue.

Luther sighs.

“Okay, Claire,” he says. “You mind staying here with Auntie Vanya while I go check on Uncle Klaus?”

She nods, a little smile on her face that tells Luther they’ve succeeded in this portion of the damage control, at least.

And then — bizarrely, surprising Luther enough that every muscle in his body pulls taut — Vanya lays a hand on his arm, feather light. He barely feels it through his shirt, and yet it’s the _only_ thing he can feel for a solid two or three seconds.

“You got this?” she asks.

Luther takes a breath. Nods. Feels that weird, icy, anxious feeling bleed out of his arm from the place she’s touched him. “Yeah,” he tells her, meeting her eyes and offering a small smile. “Time to go rip the band-aid, I guess.”

 

-

 

By the time he gets up to Klaus’ bedroom, it’s been somewhere in the ballpark of a hundred and sixty seconds since Five left the kitchen.

In that time, it seems, he’s actually done a surprisingly decent job of calming Klaus down.

Sort of.

Klaus is sat against the headboard of his bed, curled into as tight a ball as his lanky frame can probably allow, knees pulled up to his chest and his face tucked down between them, both hands tugging through his hair and the heels of his palms pressing into his temples. He doesn’t look _great,_ obviously, but his shoulders seem to be rising and falling at semi-even intervals at least, even if they’re still trembling a bit.

Five, sitting cross-legged in front of him, takes one look at Luther carefully shouldering his way through the doorway and all but _scrambles_ to move out of the way, eagerly yielding the floor — er, mattress — to him. He doesn’t leave the bed, instead fitting himself with his back against the wall, staying within arm’s reach of Klaus but still leaving plenty of space for Luther to take over.

Which… yeah, Luther probably should have figured that’d be the case. He’d offered, after all.

He just wishes he didn’t feel so horribly unqualified for it.

Because, yeah, he’s known how to handle it when Five zones out, or when the pressure of being around so many _people_ suddenly gets to be too much and he can tell that Five is seconds away from a panic attack himself. But Five is easier. Luther’s understood, to an extent, some of what his oldest brother’s been through. Isolation, he understands. Feeling out of place, he understands. Being in a body that feels wrong, that doesn’t feel like _you_ — well, of course he understands that. For anything else, all the reading and some guesswork has filled in the blanks well enough.

But he doesn’t even know _why_ Klaus is freaking out, let alone how to fix it.

Luther takes a slow breath, steels his resolve, and makes his way across the room to sit on the side of the bed.

“Klaus?” he asks. “Hey. You still here with us?”

Luther tilts his head, watching Klaus take a deep, shuddering breath. He nods. Or jerks his head in a general nodding motion, anyway. Luther figures he’ll take it.

“Cool. Okay. Cool, uh. Do you…? Do you wanna talk about it?”

At that, Klaus curls a little further into himself, which Luther hadn’t thought possible. He drags both hands through his hair, back and forth, from his hairline all the way down to the nape of his neck and back up. Then he asks, his voice sounding like sandpaper, “Claire okay?”

Luther almost laughs. Almost.

“Yeah, Klaus, she’s fine. Vanya told her you ate something bad. She, uh… thinks you’re throwing up, actually,” Luther tells him, and he lifts up the bottle in his hand and gives it a gentle swirl. “Hence the ginger ale. She wouldn’t let me leave the kitchen without it.”

And — ah _ha._ That’s enough to get Klaus to look up.

His head lifts just a few inches, his brows knit together, and when his red-rimmed eyes land on the ginger ale he lets out a choked sort of laugh that sounds only marginally as miserable as he looks, and he drops his forehead back down onto his knees. Even Five laughs a bit.

“Yeah,” Luther agrees, smiling, and he places the ginger ale on the corner of the nightstand. The smile fades as he chews on his cheek, looking Klaus over, and he wrings his hands together in his lap. “You know… you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, Klaus. We’re not gonna make you. We’re here either way, but… I don’t know, talking about it might help. Maybe. I mean, I don’t even know what… Was it the fire? Or the, uh, the light bulb blowing up?”

Klaus sniffs, lifting his head from his knees so that he can drag his forearm across his whole face, smearing eyeliner all over his cheeks and staining his sleeve, and he directs those miserable watery eyes at Luther. His mouth stays firmly shut, frown unwavering. He’s chewing on the inside of his lip.

“I mean, it’s… it’s up to you, though,” Luther’s quick to backtrack, lifting his hands. “If you don’t want to, that’s okay. I just… um, thought, you know, ‘cause it’s helped —”

His voice cuts off, though, because Klaus scoots forward with surprising speed and all but throws his entire body weight into Luther’s chest.

“God, Luther,” Klaus mutters, as he winds his arms tight around Luther’s waist. “Just shut up, okay?”

Luther blinks, staring wide-eyed down at the top of Klaus’ head — _down_ at his head, because even though Klaus was never that much shorter than him, he’s slouching a ton to be able to bury his face into Luther’s chest. Then Luther glances to his right at Five, who’s still sitting back against the wall and only offers a shrug as if to say, _Well, what the hell else were you expecting? It’s Klaus._

And that’s fair, he supposes.

He’s just not used to people… hugging him. Not anymore. He used to be more than liberal with _giving_ hugs, lifting his brothers and sisters off their feet just because he could. But that was — before. Before the accident. Before the moon.

Still. This is Klaus, and Klaus is hugging him around the middle and trembling like he’s about to fall to pieces, so Luther heaves a sigh and sinks into the hug and drops his chin on top of his brother’s head. He silently rubs his back as Klaus hiccups a sob and then starts _actually_ crying, full on weeping into Luther’s chest with shaky little inhales. And if Luther weren’t — well, if he weren’t _him,_ he has a feeling Klaus would be liable to bruise something with how tight he’s holding on, clinging to Luther like a lifeline, his fists bunching up the back of his shirt.

After a moment Five reaches out, too. He lays a hand on Klaus’ upper arm and leaves it there, unmoving but present while Klaus cries it out.

It seems like they stay there forever, holding Klaus together between the two of them.

Eventually, though, Klaus seems to wear himself out. A little. Enough to speak, anyway. He slumps against Luther, his sobs reduced to sniffling, and his voice is raspy and quiet when he admits, “I don’t… I don’t know what happened.”

“It’s okay,” Luther says, automatic but no less sincere, still rubbing his back.

Klaus sniffs again. “Just… that fire went up, and it wasn’t even… I don’t — I don’t know, all I could see was _fucking_ napalm all over again.”

Wait.

… Napalm?

Luther frowns, shooting a confused look down at his brother.

“Shit,” Five breathes, just south of an actual hiss. He drops his hand from Klaus’ arm to scrub at his face, shaking his head. “God damn it.”

“What?” Luther asks.

“The goddamn Vietnam War, that’s what,” Five says, _bafflingly,_ grinding his teeth as he glares at some vague point on the opposite wall. “Seriously, Klaus? That’s where you went?”

“Where he…?”

“With Hazel and Cha Cha’s briefcase,” Five explains, and judging by the way Klaus curls into a smaller ball in Luther’s arms, it seems he’s hitting it right on the mark. “He stole it. Time traveled. Came back ten months later.”

Luther hears a choked sound and realizes a second later that it came from his own throat.

“Ten _months—?!”_

“For him. Not for us,” Five corrects mildly, like that somehow makes it any better. “For us it was probably about six hours.”

“What—? And you _knew?”_

“Knew that he time traveled and came back after ten months, yes,” Five says. Then he directs a mild glare at Klaus, who can’t see it, and adds, “Knew that he fought in the _goddamn Vietnam War,_ no.” He tilts his head. “Granted, I suspected it was the same time as _a_ war, what with the dog tags. Maybe. But not _in_ the war. And not _that_ one.”

Luther blinks, and then he realizes his jaw is still hanging open and he snaps it shut.

Of all the things he might have imagined could have caused Klaus to have a panic attack — the drugs, the ghosts, the frequent bouts of homelessness, Dad, even one of their more violent missions from the Umbrella Academy days, any number of other horrible things that could have happened to him — this was… a curveball, to say the least. He tries to imagine fun-loving smiley Klaus fighting in a war, _any_ war, and he finds he just can’t picture it. Can’t even picture him weilding a weapon more deadly than a butter knife.

And he’d been there for, what, almost a year?

“Jesus, Klaus, it’s been months since Hazel and Cha Cha,” Luther says, as gently as he can manage. “Why didn’t you say anything sooner?”

Klaus sniffs again, shrugging one shoulder and not lifting his head away from Luther’s chest. “Diego kinda knows,” he mumbles. “Some of it. Not the details, though.”

Luther frowns. “And he didn’t tell us?”

“Mmm.” Klaus burrows, pressing his nose into Luther’s shirt. “Told him not to.”

And Luther had to actively remind himself not to groan aloud at that, because _seriously?_

“Oh,” Klaus adds with another sniff, “and Ben knows, too. Obviously.”

“Yeah, and he’s been trying to get you to tell someone else this whole time, man, don’t leave that part out.”

Both Luther and Five jolt at the sound of that voice, but Klaus doesn’t.

 _Jesus, Ben, a little warning,_ Luther thinks as he looks up to find their long dead brother sitting on the nightstand. He’s got his right leg pulled up to his chest and his arms lazily wrapped around it, chin on his knee, looking exactly as he did the day he’d died — _nope, don’t go down that rabbit hole, Number One, not right now_ — and as Five and Luther make eye contact with him, he tenses up a bit, like being seen is just as much of a shock for him, too.

“Oh. Hey, guys.”

There’s a faint blue shimmer to his skin and his clothes, but he seems… more or less solid, Luther supposes, except for the hazy mirage sort of quality that warps him at the edges, like hot air above hotter asphalt.

“Hey, Ben,” Five says.

“Oh, _awesome,”_ Klaus mutters, sounding like he thinks it’s anything but. “You guys can see him, too, huh?”

Five nods. “For the moment, yes.”

Klaus moves his head from side to side, wiping his tear covered cheeks all over Luther’s shirt, and he shifts around and settles more comfortably with his arms still loosely wrapped around Luther’s waist. He very clearly does not plan on moving any time soon. Which is fine.

“Great, now you guys get to hear all his —” he sniffs — “all his _mother henning.”_

“It’s not mother henning,” Ben protests. “It’s common sense. Keeping all this bottled up was never good for you, and you know it.”

His image is starting to waver already. Luther can see the side table lamp on the nightstand behind him, _through_ him, but he doesn’t dwell on it. Ben will still be here, he knows, whether they can see him or not.

Another sniff. “I’m _fine.”_

“Yeah, you look it.”

“Drop dead.”

“Love you, too.”

“Klaus,” Five interrupts, rolling his eyes. “Use your brain for two seconds and think. When in our entire lives has Ben ever been wrong?”

A petulant silence is the only answer they get, and Luther snorts.

“Yeah,” Five says. “No shit.”

“Ugh, God,” Klaus groans, lifting his head only to thump his forehead down against Luther’s chest. “Luther, there’s _two_ of them. Help me.”

Luther shakes his head and raises his hands in the universal signal for _don’t look at me,_ but the retraction of the hug draws a groan from Klaus that sounds more like a whine, and so Luther rolls his eyes, lowering his chin back down on top of Klaus’ head and rubbing his back again. He won’t take Klaus’ side against Five and Ben, not even when they’re wrong and especially not now when they’re so clearly right. Klaus definitely should have told them about this sooner, he should have trusted at least one of them rather than keeping it all bottled up, or he should have at least told _someone._ But Luther’s not looking to press the issue.

What’s done is done. He’s just here for damage control.

“Look, just…” Luther starts, then sighs. “It’s okay. Alright? Really, it’s okay. But we’re concerned, Klaus. We’re just saying maybe you should, you know…”

“Talk to your family for once?” Ben offers, then tilts his head. “Other than me.”

“Yeah, that’d be a good start,” Luther agrees, offering the hazy almost-an-afterimage of Ben a grateful smile, which Ben returns. “I mean, we’re all here. We’re your family. We’re… you know.” He shrugs one shoulder, gulps. “Trying. We’re talking to each other more. We’re trying to be there for each other more. You shouldn’t be excluding yourself from that.” He sighs. “What I’m saying is, just… talk to somebody when you need it, okay? It doesn’t even have to be me or Five or Ben. Just _somebody.”_

“And maybe don’t swear them into secrecy when you do,” Five mutters.

“Right. That, too,” Luther agrees. “You know. Baby steps.”

Klaus huffs a tired laugh, and he asks, “One day at a time, huh?”

Luther smiles and gives him a little squeeze. “Yeah. Sure. One day at a time.”

 

-

 

Claire absolutely insists they turn that night into a Family Movie Night.

Though “absolutely insists” might not be the most accurate term, given that no one in that house so much as _considers_ refusing. Luckily Claire happens to have an aunt and five uncles who never had much time for those kinds of things when _they_ were children, and as such they, unlike Allison, have not seen any of Claire’s favorite movies at all, let alone enough times to be sick of them yet.

It’s a new experience for all of them.

Family Movie Night is held in the living room, the same living room that Diego and Luther have been spending the last few months slowly remodeling, taking down the creepy portraits and the decorations that make it feel like Dad’s still haunting the place, adding softer and plusher furniture, sequestering away all the bar contents into an honest-to-God cabinet with a childproof lock. That kind of thing.

Allison works on getting the movie started, fanning through a pile of DVDs and holding them up one at a time for Claire to announce _yes_ or _no_ while she sprints around the living room. She runs to the front corner of the room, where her Uncle Five keeps disappearing and reappearing from various rooms in the house to add another stolen blanket or pillow or stuffed animal to the hoard they’re building up, and she scoops up as many as she can carry in her arms and throws them wildly at whoever will catch them.

Run to the corner, run toward the couch, throw, and repeat.

Diego hops up into the corner of the L-shaped couch so he can kick his feet up, bowl of popcorn already in one hand, and catches a pillow with the other.

“Nice throw, kid.”

“Thanks!”

Ben, almost corporeal enough that he doesn’t even look like a ghost anymore, waves Diego’s legs aside and sits down where they’d been, and he allows Diego to lower his feet back down onto his — apparently solid — lap.

“This one?” Allison asks, holding up a DVD.

“Nope!” Claire shouts, tossing a blanket haphazardly at the ceiling.

Klaus stumbles through the piles of blankets and pillows that already litter the floor, grabbing up a few of them on his way to the couch. Not that it’s necessary, really, since for the last few hours Claire has taken it upon herself to be his very own nurse, and _nursing_ for a five-year-old amounts to putting her head on his chest to hear his heartbeat, shoving a new bottle of ginger ale at him every time he finishes the last one, and stocking him with more blankets than any one person could ever need.

(Klaus has been taking the babying with the utmost enthusiasm, to the surprise of absolutely no one.)

He climbs up onto the couch beside Diego, curling up in four or five blankets and leaning into Diego’s side. And sure enough, the next armful of blankets that Claire picks up is thrown directly on top of him.

“Aw, thanks, kiddo!”

“You’re welcome!”

Five reappears again beside the truly absurd pile of blankets and pillows and stuffed animals and throws one last pillow on top. Then he wraps himself in what Luther is fairly certain is the comforter from Diego’s bed, and he waltzes over toward everyone else and plops right down on the floor, his back to the inner corner of the couch.

“That’s all of them, Claire.”

“Every room?”

“All forty-two of them.”

“Okay!” Claire says, and she positions herself on the opposite side of the pile and shoves it all in the general direction of the couch. “Thanks, Uncle Five!”

He tucks himself deeper into the oversized comforter he’s all but drowning in, offering Claire a surprisingly carefree smile and looking, for once, like an actual teenager. It’s a good look on him. “Any time.”

Once Claire seems satisfied that the pillows and blankets and stuffed animals are all well within everyone’s reach, she climbs up onto the couch beside her Uncle Klaus and burrows her way under his mountain of blankets to snuggle up against him.

Luther sits himself on a pillow on the floor beside Five, still careful to give him plenty of space, and he hears Claire whisper behind him, “How are you feeling, Uncle Klaus?”

“Oh, much better, Nurse Claire, much better,” Klaus whispers back. “Thank you _very_ much.”

“Claire, honey,” Allison calls out, lifting up the sixth or seventh DVD. “This one?”

“Nope!”

Allison drops that one back into the stack, lifts another, and Luther tries to squint to read the titles since every cover sort of looks the same to him. It’s no use. He can’t tell the difference.

At the eighth or ninth DVD, Claire gasps like her mom’s just held up the Holy Grail, and she cries out, “That one! That one!”

Allison laughs, says, “Okay, baby,” and pops in the DVD without another word. Then she stands and scoops up a few blankets on her way to the couch, fluffing one of them out to throw it over Luther as she passes him. She weaves around him to climb up onto the couch and join her daughter, and as Luther looks over his shoulder he sees her snuggle up into Claire’s side and reach over to affectionately ruffle Klaus’ hair.

And as the title card lights up the screen, the last of their siblings finally joins them.

Luther expects Vanya to wedge herself in whatever space on the couch is still available, maybe next to Allison behind him, maybe between Diego and Ben. But instead she just grabs a blanket and settles on the floor right beside _him,_ her shoulder just a hair’s breadth from his upper arm, a bag of pretzels in her free hand.

He tries not to freeze up. He doesn’t really succeed.

When she whispers, she does it a touch more quietly than their five-year-old niece, so it’s clear that only Luther is meant to hear it.

“How’s Klaus?”

Oh, he thinks, okay. That makes sense. That’s why she sat next to him. He relaxes just a bit, and nods. “Yeah, he’s fine. Or, you know.” He shrugs one shoulder. “Will be.”

Music starts filtering in through the TV speakers. The screen lights up with the sort of dazzling, beautiful colors that Luther’s noticed only seem to be present in Claire’s movies. And still, Vanya doesn’t move away. She doesn’t take the answer she came for and then leave, moving to sit beside one of their other siblings.

Instead she asks, “And you?”

Luther blinks. He almost thinks he heard her wrong; the music has started rising in a crescendo, gaining enough volume that he _could_ have heard her wrong.

But he didn’t.

He swallows around an odd feeling in his throat, glancing over his shoulder at everyone else. Ben, smiling and content to just be around his family after years spent in the shadows. Diego, one hand absently digging through the popcorn and his other arm slung around both Klaus and Claire, all three of whom are watching the movie with wide transfixed eyes. Five, comfortably nestled into what he’s turned into a veritable throne of pillows, squinting at the TV with Diego’s comforter wrapped around his shoulders. Allison, always happy if Claire is around, meets Luther’s eyes and offers a gentle smile.

He turns back to the TV.

“Yeah,” he whispers back to Vanya, nodding, before realizing that doesn’t really answer the question she’d asked. He clarifies, “Never better, actually.”

And it’s the truth.

Vanya seems to like that answer, because she holds out the bag of pretzels in a wordless offer, which he takes, finally allowing himself to fully relax and sit back and watch the movie with his family.

And if, as the movie goes on, Klaus starts unfurling from his snuggled up spot on the couch and his shins start leaning into Luther’s back, and if Five turns and kicks his feet over Luther’s lap to get more comfortable, and if Vanya eventually leans her head against his upper arm… Well. He’s not complaining.

 


End file.
